The Soft Life Is Over For Thai Banks
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As Chartsiri Sophonpanich enters a hallway in the headquarters of Bangkok Bank Ltd., dozens of employees melt away and clear a path, bowing with hands folded upwards in the traditional "wai" greeting. At 36, Chartsiri is the president and heir apparent to Thailand's biggest and most powerful banking fortune, a Sophonpanich fiefdom for three generations.
Outside headquarters, though, the attitude is getting much less deferential. Determined to turn Thailand into the financial hub for the newly opening economies of Indochina, the government's technocrats are dismantling the privileges that have allowed Bangkok Bank and a handful of other ethnic Chinese banking empires to grow into hugely profitable money machines (table).